Apple finally showed off its long-awaited iCloud service on Monday, portraying it as a service that stores content, wirelessly pushes it to devices, and integrates with applications -- all at no cost to users.

iCloud was demonstrated by Apple Chief Executive Steve Jobs, who even admitted that the previous MobileMe service was not Apple's "finest hour." But he also said that despite the company's previous mistakes, iCloud is a new product.

"Today it is a real hassle and very frustrating to keep all your information and content up-to-date across all your devices," Jobs said. "iCloud keeps your important information and content up to date across all your devices. All of this happens automatically and wirelessly, and because its integrated into our apps you dont even need to think about itit all just works."

Apple is ready to ramp iCloud in its three data centers, including the third recently completed in Maiden, NC. Apple has invested over $500 million in its Maiden data center to support the expected customer demand for the free iCloud services.

The free iCloud services include:
The former MobileMe services -- Contacts, Calendar and Mail -- all completely re-architected and rewritten to work seamlessly with iCloud. Users can share calendars with friends and family, and the ad-free push Mail account is hosted at me.com. Your inbox and mailboxes are kept up-to-date across all your iOS devices and computers.

The App Store and iBookstore now download purchased iOS apps and books to all your devices, not just the device they were purchased on. In addition, the App Store and iBookstore now let you see your purchase history, and simply tapping the iCloud icon will download any apps and books to any iOS device (up to 10 devices) at no additional cost.

iCloud Storage seamlessly stores all documents created using iCloud Storage APIs, and automatically pushes them to all your devices. When you change a document on any device, iCloud automatically pushes the changes to all your devices. Apples Pages®, Numbers® and Keynote® apps already take advantage of iCloud Storage. Users get up to 5GB of free storage for their mail, documents and backupwhich is more amazing since the storage for music, apps and books purchased from Apple, and the storage required by Photo Stream doesnt count towards this 5GB total. Users will be able to buy even more storage, with details announced when iCloud ships this fall.

iClouds Photo Stream service automatically uploads the photos you take or import on any of your devices and wirelessly pushes them to all your devices and computers. So you can use your iPhone to take a dozen photos of your friends during the afternoon baseball game, and they will be ready to share with the entire group on your iPad (or even Apple TV) when you return home. Photo Stream is built into the photo apps on all iOS devices, iPhoto on Macs, and saved to the Pictures folder on a PC. To save space, the last 1,000 photos are stored on each device so they can be viewed or moved to an album to save forever. Macs and PCs will store all photos from the Photo Stream, since they have more storage. iCloud will store each photo in the cloud for 30 days, which is plenty of time to connect your devices to iCloud and automatically download the latest photos from Photo Stream via Wi-Fi.

iTunes in the Cloud lets you download your previously purchased iTunes music to all your iOS devices at no additional cost, and new music purchases can be downloaded automatically to all your devices. In addition, music not purchased from iTunes can gain the same benefits by using iTunes Match, a service that replaces your music with a 256 kbps AAC DRM-free version if it can be matched to the over 18 million songs in the iTunes Store, it makes the matched music available in minutes (instead of weeks to upload your entire music library), and uploads only the small percentage of unmatched music. iTunes Match will be available this fall for a $24.99 annual fee. Apple today is releasing a free beta version of iTunes in the Cloud, without iTunes Match, for iPhone, iPad and iPod touch users running iOS 4.3. iTunes in the Cloud will support all iPhones that iOS 5 supports this fall.
Features of iCloud were also demonstrated Monday at Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference keynote. Details from those live demos and presentations are included below:

Contact, Calendar and Mail Sync

Like MobileMe, iCloud will offer syncing of contacts, calendars and mail. It will also be an ad-free service, and will ship with all iOS 5 devices this fall.

iCloud will come set up by default on new iOS 5 devices. Users will also be given 5GB of storage for mail, all free through the new service.

iCloud will be integrated in the App Store on iOS devices, allowing users to see all of the applications they own, even if they are not installed on the current device.

Backup to the Cloud

Devices can also be backed up to the cloud, for users who want to become truly PC-free. Content will be backed up to the cloud every day, and users will identify their account with a username and password login on any device.

Backups will occur over Wi-Fi only, and will apply to a number of applications on iOS devices, including purchased music, books and applications; photos and video stored in the camera roll; device settings; and app data.

Documents in the Cloud

A new feature called Documents in the Cloud automatically backs up documents created in Pages, Numbers or Keynote in the iCloud service. The newly released versions of the iWork suite for iOS already have this feature built in.

Developers will also have access to iCloud application programming interfaces for their software. Applications will be allowed to store full documents, and they will be pushed to a user's device automatically. It will work across all iOS devices, as well as Macs and PCs.

Photo Stream

Photo Stream will also bring the cloud to photos, allowing users to back up and sync pictures automatically. With the new service, photos will be available to access on any device. On iOS, this will be accomplished right within the Photos application.

To save memory, the last 1,000 photos will be stored on iOS devices, while in the cloud, photos will be saved for 30 days. Users can choose to keep a photo permanently by moving it into an album.

iTunes in the Cloud

With iTunes in the cloud, users will also be able to redownload songs to any device at no additional cost. Just as with applications on the App Store, content that is already owned will be represented with an iCloud icon.

A new setting in iOS will also allow automatic downloads of content on other devices. A new tab for purchased items will reside in the iTunes application. Songs are AAC files at 256Kbps and can be pushed to up to 10 devices.

How does this iCloud work for those of us who share an AppleID within a family? For example, my wife and I share our iTunes app purchases, but don't want to sync our calendars and mail. Is it possible to divorce the two?

I wish I could set some smart control for my iPhone's wifi, so it connects when i want it to but doesn't run down the battery when I don't.

Maybe it could check the GPS location of the networks in my fixed list and only check for wifi when the 3G cell tower says it's in the right general area, otherwise go to sleep as there's no point otherwise. I'm sure some clever tech can figure it out - I don't want to have to remember to switch wifi back on each time I return home or to a hotel room, then switch it back off to save battery the rest of the time.

Many of the most important software concepts were invented in the 70s and forgotten in the 80s.

iCloud may be free for now, but this is going to be transferring a LOT of data over 3G.
So it looks like "free" from Apple means me paying $10-$25 more a month with AT&T on a new data plan or overages.

UPDATE: looks like iCloud is WiFi only for now. (still watching keynote...)

iCloud may be free for now, but this is going to be transferring a LOT of data over 3G.
So it looks like "free" from Apple means me paying $10-$25 more a month with AT&T on a new data plan or overages.

I would guess this is laying the foundation for some significant hardware change in future mobile device release. In a sense, you could eliminate or minimize the need for dedicated storage on the device. Dunno if anyone here can comment on whether that saves significant space or not.

I don't think they're going to make us pay for iCloud, ever. They are locking us in with the free offer, but not to make us pay for the service later -- to force us use their hardware. It's a smart move. And I don't really care, anyway.. I'll happily use their hardware.

I would guess this is laying the foundation for some significant hardware change in future mobile device release. In a sense, you could eliminate or minimize the need for dedicated storage on the device. Dunno if anyone here can comment on whether that saves significant space or not.

I think there'll always be a need for on-device storage. The problem is that the potential for maxing out that storage grows daily. You could do it with photos alone, never mind photos + audio recordings + music + books + TV + music + apps. And people who buy iOS devices aren't necessarily people who want to fuss with external hard drives. Apple was eventually going to have to support these new devices in an 'invisible' and automated way.

Today's announcements are another step forward for Apple's PC-free future. (In which anyone still using a Mac will automatically be a 'power user' to some degree.)

A bit disappointed that all the hoopla about the songs being stored in the cloud and being streamed down to us didn't work out. but, I suppose that would use even more data from the plan then doing it this way.

unless those are very slim new Mac Pros. Perhaps an admission that Apple's presence in the cloud itself is at an end? With OS X Server now an addon, it seems destined to be used for things like home servers for which the Mini is ideal (when it gets updated).

Overall, some nice and long awaited features but I'm mostly not too fussy about cloud syncing. Transparent wireless local syncing is fine by me if it can do it via wifi-direct. Untethered updates and activation is great to hear. Now it just needs to be able to access large amounts of storage with a filesystem and it can make for a nice post-PC device.

iCloud service is free to start in order to get people hooked. Then bam...a year or two down the road it will no longer be free.

That's why they get paid millions and you have time to post on a message board during work hours Failure to think creatively.

It will not go from free to paid. The lock-in factor is FAR more valuable than any small amount of money that would earn them, plus as we all know (or I thought we did) you can't raise the price of anything digital.

So what happens to current MobileMe subscribers access to iDisk? I use it quite frequently. Also I currently host my iWeb site on MobileMe. Is that still going to be supported in iCloud? Hopefully email Aliases aren't going away as I use those daily. So many questions!

"We're going to move the digital hub, the center of your digital life, into the cloud."

You will be moving the center of my life? I believe you should better focus on removing the money from my pocket. The center of life can wait.

Quote:

"Isn't that awesome?"

A technology all kinds of googles, dropboxes and evernotes have been around with for last 5 years. Oh yes, it is.

Hold on. I've got a small bit of the center of my life for you to get started on... I have a very good friend, who sends me everything as PDF files. No secrets, no business, just usual bullshit.
I receive his PDF. See where I'm coming from?
Would love to instantly have that PDF with me on all my devices! Now!

We mean Apple no harm.

People are lovers, basically. -- Engadget livebloggers at the iPad mini event.

Yes, then use the cash to buy someone that knows how to write sync code. ( Hello Mr. DropBox ).

I'm so tired of comments like this.

The *ONLY* reason DropBox is fast is because in most cases it doesn't actually have to sync or move data, it just gives you access to a file that's the same as the file you wanted to sync, not the actual file you wanted to sync. This is arguably a dangerous and poor practice overall for personal files.

So what happens to current MobileMe subscribers access to iDisk? I use it quite frequently. Also I currently host my iWeb site on MobileMe. Is that still going to be supported in iCloud? Hopefully email Aliases aren't going away as I use those daily. So many questions!

So what happens to current MobileMe subscribers access to iDisk? I use it quite frequently. Also I currently host my iWeb site on MobileMe. Is that still going to be supported in iCloud? Hopefully email Aliases aren't going away as I use those daily. So many questions!

I am REALLY worried about this as well. Are there any developers in here who have a beta of Lion who can confirm the "iDisk" still in Finder's "Go" menu?

Meh...
I would like to know why those of us that just renewed our MobileMe's in the past 2-3 months did it...

Apple, I would love to get an Apple Gift card for the difference!

That is exactly what I am thinking!! I renewed mine in March, and now this happens... WTH?

Edit: Just read the KB article pointed out by titomcgee, and while they have extended it, that doesn't exactly help those of us who paid for a Family Pack, and now only to be getting a free version of it in 3 months (there-abouts). I am just wondering what they are going to do for those customers.